Kinman Guitar Electrix is a boutique Australian company that specializes in the design and manufacture of innovative Zero-Hum (hum-canceling) pickups for electric guitars that solve noise problems associated with single coil pickups
One of its most popular products is the Kinman Hx (an initialism for Hum cancelling) pickup, a patented noiseless pickup design developed in 1996 by its founder, Chris Kinman, as a direct drop-in replacement for Fender Stratocaster style single coil pickups. Most of the models in the Kinman line carry the designation AVn, an initialism for Authentic Vintage noiseless (although Kinman himself prefers the term Zero-Hum since buzz from wiring is also noise and can only be prevented with shielding of wiring cavities in the guitar).
In 1998 Kinman embarked on development of technology specifically for Telecaster guitars that was not introduced until circa 2001. The technology centers around a patented laminated steel H-core bobbin that functions as a noise sensing coil. It is made of 150 separate pieces of steel. The H-core is interesting because it performs far more efficiently than conventional noise sensing bobbins using steel core pins, requiring less turns of copper wire to produce the required hum voltage. There is a strong correlation between sonic signature of a hum canceling pickup and the number of turns and diameter of copper wire contained in the hum sensor.
Circa 2003 Kinman introduced a line of No-Soldering Harness for Stratocasters and Telecasters that allow guitar players to install pickups and harness into their instruments without the need for soldering, which is the usual method. Some models incorporate a switching system that provides 9 different sounds by connecting various pickups in series as well as parallel and combinations thereof.
In October 2009, after an inventive development period of almost 9 years, Kinman released a hum-canceling P-90 pickup known as the P-90 Hx. It incorporates new 'patent applied for' magnetic circuit technology which allows a minimal 600 Ohm noise sensor. Kinman claims this new noise sensor technology is responsible for unusually accurate reproduction of P-90 sound. The P-90 Hx is also remarkable for its 202 individual components including 2 Alnico bar magnets, a normal P-90 has about 12 components making the P-90 Hx the most complex and sophisticated guitar pickup yet.
Kinmans new 'patent applied for' technology concerning their 600 Ohm noise sensor has given rise to a new breed of hum-canceling pickups for Stratocaster and Telecaster also with 600 Ohm noise sensors. These new models are remarkable because the 600 Ohm noise sensor allows the pickups to generate accurate sonic reproduction of the original sound of Stratocaster and Telecaster pickups despite being hum-canceling which hitherto has been impossible to achieve.
The Impersonator 54 Strat pickup incorporating H-core technology introduced circa 2010 has received wide acclaim for its authentic reproduction of the sound of Fender's CS-54 noisy single coil. Hank Marvin preferred the CS54 to achieve his 1960s Shadows lead guitar sound and Kinman's Impersonator 54 was created at Hanks request for a noiseless version of the C-54. The CS-54 is used extensively for all kinds of musical environments.
Kinman holds the most number of patents concerned with increasing the efficiency of and minimizing the noise sensing coils in hum-canceling guitar pickups.
Circa mid-2011 the company released a range of innovative Gibson style Humbuckers. Somewhat of a departure from single coils Kinman applied technology derived from their single coils to improve the sound of the conventional humbucker. Kinman claims to improve articulation, clarity, transparency of the low wound strings and touch sensitivity of the iconic humbucker. Kinman humbuckers also set a new benchmark for quietness where hum is concerned (most conventional humbucker construction is asymmetric to a degree thus the imbalance between the coils causes some hum).
One model, the P90-Bucker, sounds close to a P-90. It has a definite single coil vibe which has been along sought after goal which Gibson themselves sought to achieve when they designed their original PAF humbucking pickup. However, their PAF turned out to be a very different sounding pickup compared to a P-90. The P90-Bucker delivers a very similar sound to a P-90 with Zero-Hum and is a direct replacement for existing humbuckers. The Twang Bucker produces 100% single coil sound with 0% Hum.
Around April 2013 Kinman released a Zero-Hum pickup for Fender's Jazzmaster guitar, the very first Zero-Hum pickup for Jazzmaster. Its advanced technology and its 600 Ohm hum sensor was cunningly designed so that the entire pickup fits inside a Fender Jazzmaster cover and no routing of the pickup cavity is necessary. That was a challenging problem since pickup cavities in the Jazzmaster are quite shallow compared to those in Stratocasters and Telecasters. The 600 Ohm hum sensor also allows exceptional high frequency response and dynamic range which is a hallmark of Kinman pickups. These Jazzmaster pickups are available in several models (FatMaster, a bigger version of thin original sound; ThickMaster, a thick and syrupy sound not unlike Charlie Christian's sound; SurfMaster, a highly dynamic sound in the sonic ilk of Dick Dale)
Coinciding with the launch of Kinman's new website is the releases of Zero-Hum Gold Foil, 580 Alnico Staple, Jaguar and Mustang pickups as well as their new KHP-90 Goodbye-Soldering Harness for 1 and 2 pickup guitars in the ilk of Gibson and PRS.
Patents
Chris Kinman has been awarded the following US patents:
A humbucking pickup, humbucker, or double coil, is a type of electric guitar pickup that uses two coils to "buck the hum" picked up by coil pickups caused by electromagnetic interference, particularly mains hum. Most pickups use magnets to produce a magnetic field around the strings, and induce an electrical current in the surrounding coils as the strings vibrate. Humbuckers work by pairing a coil that has the north poles of its magnets oriented "up" with another coil right next to it with the south pole of its magnets oriented up. By connecting the coils together out of phase, the interference is significantly reduced via phase cancellation: the string signals from both coils add up instead of canceling, because the magnets are placed in opposite polarity. The coils can be connected in series or in parallel in order to achieve this hum-cancellation effect, although it's much more common for the coils of a humbucker pickup to be connected in series. In addition to electric guitar pickups, humbucking coils are sometimes used in dynamic microphones to cancel electromagnetic hum.
The Fender Stratocaster is a model of electric guitar designed from 1952 into 1954 by Leo Fender, Bill Carson, George Fullerton, and completed by Freddie Tavares. The Fender Musical Instruments Corporation has continuously manufactured the Stratocaster from 1954 to the present. It is a double-cutaway guitar, with an extended top "horn" shape for balance like the Precision Bass guitar. Along with the Gibson Les Paul and Fender Telecaster, it is one of the most-often emulated electric guitar shapes. "Stratocaster" and "Strat" are trademark terms belonging to Fender. Guitars that duplicate the Stratocaster by other manufacturers are usually called S-Type or ST-type guitars.
A single coil pickup is a type of magnetic transducer, or pickup, for the electric guitar and the electric bass. It electromagnetically converts the vibration of the strings to an electric signal. Single coil pickups are one of the two most popular designs, along with dual-coil or "humbucking" pickups.
Seth E. Lover was a designer of amplifiers and musical instrument electronics and effects. He is most famous for developing the Gibson humbucker or hum-cancelling electric stringed instrument pickup, most often used on the electric guitar.
The Fender Jazzmaster is an electric guitar designed as a more expensive sibling to the Fender Stratocaster. First introduced at the 1958 NAMM Show, it was initially marketed to jazz guitarists, but found favor among surf rock guitarists in the early 1960s. Its appearance is similar to the Jaguar, though it is tonally and physically different in many technical ways, including pickup design, scale length and controls.
The Fender Jaguar is an electric guitar by Fender Musical Instruments characterized by an offset-waist body, a relatively unusual switching system with two separate circuits for lead and rhythm, and a medium-scale 24" neck. Owing some roots to the Jazzmaster, it was introduced in 1962 as Fender's feature-laden top-of-the-line model, designed to lure players from Gibson. During its initial 13-year production run, the Jaguar did not sell as well as the less expensive Stratocaster and Telecaster, and achieved its most noticeable popularity in the surf music scene. After the Jaguar was taken out of production in 1975, vintage Jaguars became popular first with American punk rock players, and then more so during the alternative rock, shoegazing and indie rock movements of the 1980s and 1990s. Fender began making a version in Japan in the mid-1980s, and then introduced a USA-made reissue in 1999. Since then, Fender has made a variety of Jaguars in America, Mexico, Indonesia and China under both the Fender and Squier labels. Original vintage Jaguars sell for many times their original price.
The Jazz Bass is the second model of electric bass created by Leo Fender. It is distinct from the Precision Bass in that its tone is brighter and richer in the midrange and treble with less emphasis on the fundamental frequency. The body shape is also different from the Precision Bass, in that the Precision Bass has a symmetrical lower bout on the body, designed after the Telecaster and Stratocaster lines of guitars, while the Jazz Bass has an offset lower bout, mimicking the design aesthetic of the Jaguar and Jazzmaster guitars.
The Fender Cyclone denotes a series of electric guitars made by Fender. Introduced in late 1997, the Cyclone body is similarly styled to the Mustang, but it is a quarter of an inch thicker than the body of a Mustang and is made of poplar, whereas contemporary Mustang reissues were made of basswood.
A pickup is a transducer that captures or senses mechanical vibrations produced by musical instruments, particularly stringed instruments such as the electric guitar, and converts these to an electrical signal that is amplified using an instrument amplifier to produce musical sounds through a loudspeaker in a speaker enclosure. The signal from a pickup can also be recorded directly.
The Fender Telecaster Deluxe is a solid-body electric guitar originally produced from 1972 to 1981, and since re-issued by Fender in 2004 as the '72 Telecaster Deluxe.
The P-90 is a single coil electric guitar pickup produced by Gibson since 1946. Gibson is still producing P-90s, and there are outside companies that manufacture replacement versions. Compared to other single coil designs, such as the ubiquitous Fender single coil, the bobbin for a P-90 is wider but shorter. The Fender style single coil is wound in a taller bobbin but the wires are closer to the individual poles. This makes the P-90 produce a different type of tone, somewhat warmer with less edge and brightness. As with other single-coil pickups, the P-90 is subject to mains hum unless some form of hum cancelling is used.
A P.A.F. or simply PAF is an early model of the humbucker guitar pickup invented by Seth Lover in 1955. Gibson began use of the PAF on higher-model guitars in late 1956 and stopped in around 1962. They were replaced by the Patent Number pickup, essentially a refined version of the PAF. These were in turn replaced by "T-Top" humbuckers in 1967, and production ended in 1975. Though it is commonly mistaken as the first humbucker pickup, the PAF was the first humbucker to gain widespread use and notoriety. The PAF is an essential tonal characteristic of the now-famous 1957-1960 Gibson Les Paul Standard guitars, and pickups of this type have gained a large following.
The Fender Wide Range Humbucker is a humbucker guitar pickup, designed by Seth Lover for Fender in the early 1970s. This pickup was intended to break Fender's image as a "single coil guitar company", and to gain a foothold in the humbucker guitar market dominated by Gibson.
The Lace Sensor is a guitar pickup designed by Don Lace and manufactured by AGI since 1985.
Fender California Series electric guitars were produced by Fender in 1997 and 1998. The guitars were carved in California, shipped to Baja California for painting, then assembled in California.
The Fender Noiseless series is a line of electric guitar pickups made by the Fender Musical Instruments Corporation. Introduced in 1998, they feature a stacked-coil design. A single-coil stack consists of two single-coil pickups stacked on top of each other, compacted to fit into the size of a regular single-coil pickup. This is to be contrasted with a humbucking pickup, which is two single-coils wound side by side.
Guitar wiring refers to the electrical components, and interconnections thereof, inside an electric guitar. It most commonly consists of pickups, potentiometers to adjust volume and tone, a switch to select between different pickups, and the output socket. There may be additional controls for specific functions; the most common of these are described below.
The Fender Telecaster, colloquially known as the Tele, is the world's first commercially successful solid-body electric guitar. Its simple yet effective design and revolutionary sound broke ground and set trends in electric guitar manufacturing and popular music. Introduced for national distribution as the Broadcaster in the autumn of 1950, it was the first guitar of its kind manufactured on a substantial scale and has been in continuous production in one form or another since its first incarnation.
Jason Lollar is an American luthier, musician, and co-founder of Lollar Pickups. A 1979 graduate of the Roberto-Venn School of Luthiery, Jason is the author of Basic Pickup Winding and Complete Guide to Making Your Own Pickup Winder, now in its third edition, and a contributor to Bart Hopkin's Getting a Bigger Sound: Pickups and Microphones for Your Musical Instrument.
Lollar Pickups is a Tacoma, Washington-based company that creates handmade pickups for electric guitar, bass, and steel guitar. The company was founded in 1995 by luthier Jason Lollar, a 1979 graduate of the Roberto-Venn School of Luthiery, and author of Basic Pickup Winding and Complete Guide to Making Your Own Pickup Winder was also a contributor to Bart Hopkin's Getting a Bigger Sound: Pickups and Microphones for Your Musical Instrument.
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